We participated in an annual meeting of the Asia Pacific Group on Money Laundering, in Kathmandu, Nepal. The meeting marked the first time wildlife crime has been included on the agenda of the group.
Two forest rangers, Sieng Darong and Sab Yoh, have been murdered in Preah Vihear Protected Forest, Cambodia. They were shot by illegal loggers, one of which has been tied to the Cambodian military, with high-powered rifles. The main driver of these crimes is unsustainable demand for rosewood timber in Vietnam and China
The EIA team which launched the new Forest Campaign report Organised Chaos: The illicit overland timber trade between Myanmar and China in Beijing met in Yangon, Myanmar with civil society groups, media, activists and representatives of international institutions such as the EU and DFID
The report 'Organised Chaos' and its accompanying film expose the scale, methods and key named actors who organise the growing illegal timber trade into China that is wreaking chaos in the forests of Myanmar.
It is heart-warming so many people were enraged by the cruel death of Cecil the lion, killed by an American hunter in Zimbabwe, but, as with all social media anger, it doesn’t last very long. Quick wins are great but rare and campaigns should be built on a fact-based footing from which long-lasting solutions are sought.
As our environment faces mounting human pressures, it is vital that we speak out to protect the last of our wilderness to restore the damage done. It will be no small challenge for Europe to meet its target of halting the loss of biodiversity and the degradation of ecosystem services by 2020.